Honda Car Forum

I own a 2004 honda civic. Temprature gauge is fluctuating. Replaced thermostat but no help there. Water is circulating through the radiator, fans come on when heated up. Possibly loosing fluid but I can't be certian about that. Heater takes a while to heat up and the will turn off when I come to a stop sign. Only 58,000 miles on my car. I drive it carefully and keep it maintained. I could all most be certian there is no blown head gasket, no cracked or warped head. Oil is still black. Water is not mixing with oil. Does the water pump take a while to go out? Any ideas? There was never a problem until I drove from dallas to corpus christi. (400 miles) I drove 5 miles below speed limit the whole way. After a couple of days in corpus I noticed an odd smell coming through the vents. Much like antifreeze but not as strong. I also noticed that the temp gauge was climbing the more I drove the more stable the temp gauge would become. I stopped at a wal mart and got anti freeze because it was dark out and I couldn't tell if I had water or not. I capped off the over flow jugg on an accident. It only took about a quarter of the bottle of anti freeze. I don't think it needed anti freeze but i'm still not sure if it was low that night. Well, the next morning, I drove back to dallas from corpus. (400 miles)I drove approximatley 240 miles and it never even once got heated up or did i see the temp gauge fluctuate. Until i got to 250 miles. I noticed it started to rise. I pulled over to let it cool. I never heard it get to the boiling point (ever). The last 150 miles of the trip back the temp guage rose to the red line of the temp guage about 5 times. Every time it rose that far i stopped my car immediatly as not not cause any damage to the engine. It never stayed at that red line for more that 10-15 seconds. I never drove it hot. For most of the trip, if I stayed between 50 and 75 miles per hour the temp guage would just stay on normal or just slightly above normal but then sometimes it would rise and fall again. Well I got all the way back to dallas and parked it overnight. The next day drove it around and it never got hot. Infact I drove it for a week straight and it never heated up. Probably didnt drive it no more than 20 miles at a time but it never heated up on me. That led me to believe it was the thermostat. I changed the thermostat and drove it around and immediatley the temp guage rose up that same night. I thought, ok maybe i got air into the system so i removed radiator cap and left it running for like 20 to 30 min. I put the cap back on and drove around. Again the temp guage rose. I can drive it for about 10 to 15 miles before it will heat up. My dad used to work on cars so I took it to him and he said it does'nt seem to have anything wrong with it. He thought it was weird. The engine sounds perfect and runs well. No hesitation-No smoke-No boiling. Just a rising guage FYI: The heater started acting up like a month or two earlier but the car never ran hot that i noticed. Also I don't want to throw a wrench into this whole story because I personally don't think this has anything to do with my problem but about a month ago my check engine light came on. I took it to auto zone and they said it had a mis fire. They reset the light and it never came back on. I do remember when the mis fire happened. I had like almost no gas in the tank. I started it up and it mis fired because it was trying to suck gas into the engine but there was none. I forgot to get gas the night before so I had to put the gas for my lawn mower into the tank to make it to the gas station to get gas. My car seems to be running perfect except for the temp guage and heat coming on and off. Very smooth idleing. I don't think that had anything to do with it but I could be wrong. I dont know. Anyway I know this is long but I had to give you all the facts to get the best answer. Thanks! FYI:the original thermostat operated great in a pan of boiling water. closed almost immediatley after i pulled it out